The popularity of proximity-based social and mobile services has grown significantly over the last few years, and the expectation is that it will continue to do so for the foreseeable future as the mobile ecosystem evolves. To meet demand for such services, neighborhood awareness networking (NAN) technology, such as Wi-Fi Aware™, was developed. A NAN protocol allows for the bidirectional sharing of information directly between nearby or proximate NAN devices without the need for an intermediary device such as a base station, access point, router, or other infrastructure device and without the need for a network connection. Accordingly, a NAN protocol is a proximity-based protocol that provides for transmissions and scanning procedures which facilitate NAN devices discovering other NAN devices within range or proximity, wherein a discovered NAN device, for instance, offers information or a service meeting a specified criteria.
One shortcoming relates to the current mechanism for locating or discovering other NAN devices within range. To do this, for instance using Wi-Fi Aware™, NAN devices continuously transmit NAN discovery beacon frames while also scanning for the NAN discovery beacon frames of other NAN devices. However, the transmission of and scanning for NAN discovery beacon frames comes at a power cost. In some cases, measurements and estimates show and predict that transmitting and scanning for NAN discovery beacon frames can account for approximately 50% of a mobile device's average power consumption over the course of a day.
Skilled artisans will appreciate that elements in the figures are illustrated for simplicity and clarity and have not necessarily been drawn to scale. For example, the dimensions of some of the elements in the figures may be exaggerated relative to other elements to help to improve understanding of embodiments of the present teachings. In addition, the description and drawings do not necessarily require the order presented. It will be further appreciated that certain actions and/or steps may be described or depicted in a particular order of occurrence while those skilled in the art will understand that such specificity with respect to sequence is not actually required.
The apparatus and method components have been represented, where appropriate, by conventional symbols in the drawings, showing only those specific details that are pertinent to understanding the embodiments of the present teachings so as not to obscure the disclosure with details that will be readily apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art having the benefit of the description herein.